The Prophecy Enigma Solved

Decoding the Prophets’ Symbolism

You may have heard of the Bible Code. This is not about that. In fact, the Bible Code, as portrayed in Christian and pop literature, is a fallacy.

This essay is about a very real code, though it was never meant to be such. It happened quite by accident. You are probably very aware of it, though you’ve probably never thought of it as a code.

This is about the Prophets’ Code: the vocabulary or lexicon used by the prophets that I call the “language of the prophets.” It is characterized by the odd and often bizarre imagery found everywhere in scripture, including latter-day revelation. Examples of this imagery are such things as wheels, candlesticks, monsters or beasts, stars, trumpets and references to arcane ideas such as fire from heaven, the heavens reeling to and fro, the moon turning to blood, Alpha and Omega, the Son of Man and so forth.

So we must ask: Why the use of such symbolic or coded language? Why a Prophets’ Code? Why mystify any of the gospel? Why not simply speak plainly so all can understand?

I maintain that the prophets’ imagery was “plain language” as it was first used and understood. From the days of Adam until the demise of the Savior and his Apostles, it was a common denominator in all ancient cultures, easily comprehended by people who could neither read nor write. But because the means to understand that language has since been systematically erased or expunged from our culture over time, it has become an enigma rather than a teaching tool.

Therein lies a remarkable story.

Codes and keys: deciphering a lost language

A code can be simple or complex. A game of language called “Pig Latin” is an example of a simple code. To use it or understand it, you must have this key: Move the first letter or consonant of each word to the end of that word, and then add an “a” (pronounced “ay”). Thus, the word “store” becomes “orestay,” or the word “happy” becomes “appyhay.” And unless bystanders can figure out the key—that is, decipher the code—they will not understand what is said by those who do have the key.

So the code’s key becomes the solution to the puzzle.

For the sake of clarity, here’s a simple encoded or encrypted text that is sometimes used to baffle the uninitiated.

“How are you? Everything here is fine. Let everyone know that I am well. Please ease their concerns.”

On the face of it, this message seems to indicate that the writer is in no danger and there is no cause for alarm. But once you decipher the code, using the key, it conveys an entirely different message.

Have you detected the key? Can you decipher the message? If so, you know the message is actually a cry for help—literally! By taking only the first letter of each sentence and putting it in the same order it appeared in the original note, we get the word HELP.

Of course, coded messages are typically more complex than that. Some messages are obviously a code because the symbols used are unfamiliar and cryptic, or the text appears scrambled. Others appear to be legitimate texts, like our little example, because they can be read quite easily. In that case, it isn’t even obvious that it is an encoded message at all, as is the case with the Prophets’ Code.

In every case, one must have the key—sometimes a combination of keys—to decipher a code. Thus, it’s safe to say that where codes are concerned, the “key” unlocks the message.

Coded language

Deciphering an unknown language, such as the Prophets’ Code, is much like decoding an encrypted message.

A good example of this is the Mayan codices. The anthropologists and linguists who are working to decipher the Mayan hieroglyphs have literally been deciphering a code, plain and simple. The very word for their writing indicates that: codices.

The Mayans didn’t intend their writing system to be a code. In fact, for them it was just the opposite. It was their way of recording and presenting their cultural, traditional and religious beliefs. All Mayans could easily “read” it.

It is the passage of time and the inevitable forgetting that comes with it that makes a once-familiar writing or teaching system into a mystery, a code. For them, it was commonplace; for us, it’s an enigma.

The prophets, the apostles and the Savior didn’t invent the Prophets’ Code. They weren’t trying to hide anything. Instead, they were using a well-established, time-honored system of sacred metaphors and symbols from their contemporary cultures to teach the gospel.

Confirmation of the key

Once the proper key is applied to its code, the message it translates becomes clear. The moment that happens, it’s obvious to all concerned that the applied key is the correct one. Thus, the key’s ability to fully interpret or translate a message confirms its validity. Put plainly, it is its own proof.

Nowhere is all this truer than in our attempt to decode the prophets’ message. And it also serves to point out the shortcomings in flawed interpretations so prevalent in Christianity today. When the key is applied—or keys in this case—the message can be read in its entirety, word for word. There are no garbled or incomprehensible segments and there is no need to take bits and pieces out of context to build an interpretation, as do all our Christian cousins.

The long-lost key

So, what is the key to the Prophet’s Code? Cosmology--the events and images projected on Earth’s ancient heavens by electrified plasmas and nearby planetary orbs generating effects and phenomena seen and experienced by all mankind. These were recorded in stone, art, ritual and tradition by the ancients, which then gave rise to the major themes or motifs of all cultures.

Those themes, called metaphors or motifs and their graphic counterparts, the icons or images, became the archetypes for all sacred expression in cultures worldwide. These were handed down from generation to generation, carefully and faithfully preserved as their sacred history.

How history became a code

An explanation of how plain language became a code can be found, of all places, in the vision of Nephi, the one I call “The History Lesson.” (1 Nephi 13.)

He is shown by an angel that the Gospel—“the words of a book”-- would first be corrupted by the Gentiles and then further defiled by “that great and abominable church.”

When we look at secular or profane history, we see just what Nephi described. First the Catholic Church rejected many texts that may have contained authentic teachings of the Savior and the apostles. It’s also apparent from textual comparison that there were many alterations and changes made by these “Gentiles.”

Hence, modern Christianity is based almost entirely on doctrine from only a few texts the Catholic fathers preferred. Actually, it’s quite likely that they chose poorly in some cases because they were not guided by revelation, as were the Apostles. These few canonical texts are thought to contain all that’s needed to be a true disciple.

Later, in the Reformation, many splinter groups broke off from the Catholic. This was the Protestant movement that saw the advent of Lutherans, Calvinists and the Church of England, among others. Like their Catholic predecessors, none of the Protestant churches claimed revelation. Hence, they embraced the same canon that the Catholics had settled upon centuries earlier, though they interpreted it somewhat differently.

At about the same time, one group denounced formal religion altogether. They embraced the doctrines of skepticism, rationalism and empiricism. They rejected both the sacred canon and the teachings of Christianity as “myths,” the product of irrational, foolish minds.

But they embraced the Catholic educational system, the “university” with all its liturgical trappings and degrees of indoctrination—once called “priesthood.” These accouterments include the robes once worn in sacred settings, the cap and gown used in commencement exercises—what Nibley famously called “the robes of false priesthood.”

They created an alternate creation story, their own version of Genesis, which they later called “the Big Bang.” They fashioned their own apostles: Lyell, Hutton, Darwin, Newton and later, Einstein.

This was the Science Church, though it refused to be equated with normative religion, casting itself as the antithesis of religion. And that is the key: It is a religion, complete with its own dogma and hierarchy. Nephi saw it for what it was and correctly referred to it as a “church.” He called it “the great and abominable church”—“great” because it infiltrated all cultures the world over, “abominable” because its doctrine denied Christ and his Gospel.

The result

As a consequence of these two major influences on Christianity, as predicted by Nephi, we can come to only one conclusion: The most common cultural and religious motifs of antiquity are unknown and unrecognized in our day and age for what they truly represent. We either misinterpret them, or we are blind to them, though they surround us. If we recognize them at all, we label them “mysteries” and then dismiss them as inexplicable. They exist in our cultural traditions and customs—even our language—and they are especially prevalent in our religions.

The result: What was once a clear and unmistakable system of related ideas is now a mystery, a conundrum, a secret and impenetrable code. According to secular and sectarian authorities, they are nothing more than “myth,” “legend,” “fairy tales” or “paganism,” having virtually nothing to do with the real world or the Gospel of Jesus Christ. So too the icons that were meant to recall and explain the imagery of all ancient culture and tradition.

Deciphering the Prophets’ Code

The good news is this: You can learn the Prophets’ Code. You can read the scriptural imagery that has heretofore completely baffled you. One need not be a prophet or even a scriptorian to read the prophets’ messages and completely understand them, without the confusion and frustration you’ve encountered in the past.

A whole new world of knowledge and understanding will open to you. You’ll see the scriptures afresh, with a entirely new perspective on the past and the future. The most enigmatic passages and visions in biblical texts—from Genesis, to Ezekiel, to Isaiah, to Revelation—and modern revelation—from Doctrine and Covenants to the Pearl of Great Price—will become as child’s play to read.

Without sounding self-serving or self-important, I suggest that you avail yourself of the information provided by this author to further your understanding of the prophets’ messages. You will benefit from my many years of study and research that now offer a unique and comprehensive understanding of the Prophets’ Code.

Read the scriptures as easily as you would read a newspaper or magazine.

Your best resource and guide is this website: www.MormonProphecy.com. I hope you will make a point of visiting. It will be my privilege to be your guide.

Prophecy for Dummies

In my quest to popularize the advancing science of comparative mythology and plasma physics as they relate to the Restored Gospel, it occurred to me that the popular “… for Dummies” series, relating to everything from auto repair to brain surgery, might be helpful. A nuts-and-bolts approach to prophetic interpretation that employed an analogy about learning to read might help others better understand my approach. The following is the result. – A.E.L.

While we’re definitely not dummies, we all previously thought that one needed a prophetic calling or a PhD in order to interpret prophecy.

But I have found that not to be the case. Anyone who has learned to read—dummies like me and you—can also learn to understand prophecy.

This is done by simply following the clues throughout history, like Hansel and Gretel followed the breadcrumb trail through the forest, tracing the images or metaphors of prophecy to their source in Earth’s ancient heavens. Then, moving forward in time from antiquity to the present, one can map out their use as the prophets consistently employed them in various epochs and in a variety of cultures.

So, reading prophecy is not all that difficult. It’s learning how to understand it that’s a bit hard. That’s because we’ve never been properly schooled in prophetic imagery, a skill once known to all the prophets that has been lost to us over the eons.

And even though Joseph Smith clearly learned that skill, properly employed it and sought to reinstate its imagery in the minds of Latter-day Saints as part of the Restoration, the membership failed to grasp his meaning. (See “The Keys To Prophecy, #1-#12" and “What Joseph Knew.”)

Yes, reading the imagery of prophecy is an acquired skill, just like riding a bike or reading. In fact, the best analogy for learning to read prophecy comes from your own experience as you first began to read.

Think back to when you couldn’t read, before you learned your ABCs. Do you recall what the printed letters on a page looked like? I can. It looked like so much meaningless gobbledygook. There was no way you or I could make sense of it no matter how long we stared at it. Flipping the pages was futile. Trying to find meaning in it was pointless.

Well, that pretty much describes the situation where prophecy is concerned. You can understand the words, but the message is strange gibberish. Try as you might to find meaning in it or make sense of it, you cannot. Instead, your head begins to hurt. Reading various prophecies only further complicates the matter. It all seems to deal in that same bizarre imagery. Even reading books on the subject by supposed ‘authorities’ on prophecy leaves you no closer to understanding the stuff. And there are whole chunks of prophecy that the 'experts' all seem to avoid. Soon you despair, thinking that making sense of prophecy is going to be nearly impossible.

To teach you how to read, the teacher first started with the alphabet and letter recognition. Each letter had a name—A was “aee,” B was “bee,” and so on. And you learned to recognize them and identify them by name. Once you mastered the alphabet, you took your first step toward reading. But you still could not read.

The same is true of prophecy. To understand it, your teacher must take you back to the basics—stars, planets and plasmas. Why stars, planets and plasmas? Well, that’s where the language of prophecy came from. Earth’s ancient heavens were once alive with planets (the ancients called them stars, not planets) and electrified, glowing, lifelike plasma phenomenon. These impressive elements riveted the attention of ancient peoples the world over and sparked an explosion of imagination and imagery in all cultures.

Just like the letters of the alphabet, what the ancients saw in those long ago skies became the building blocks of all religious tradition and culture.

As analyzed elsewhere (See "A New Heaven and a New Earth," “The Saturn Myths and the Restored Gospel,” “The Saturn Epic: In The Beginning,” “The Saturn Epic: Mythmaking,” "The Polar Configuration and Joseph Smith," “Prophets and Plasmas” and “The Electric Universe”), with a little effort you’ll discover the reasons for believing that Earth’s ancient skies were vastly different than our own today. You’ll learn of the objects and images our ancestors saw in the astronomical theater, and we’ll give names to those planets and plasmas. This will be the prophetic equivalent of learning your ABCs.

The next thing our reading teacher did was to show us that each letter had one or more sounds. That further complicated things, but we were told that it would all become clear if we just persevered. So, we went down the now familiar alphabet assigning sounds to each of them. We learned, for example, that the letter C could have an “sss” sound as in “see,” or a “kay” sound as in “cat.” This was further complication and confusion for our struggling young minds.

Unlike today, where planets are little more than bright, distant stars in the sky, these planets and plasmas were very close.They were overwhelming and imposing because they were close to the Earth. They actually appeared larger than the moon does today. Brilliantly lit, dynamic and magnificent in ancient skies, these planets and plasmas were reverenced as gods or primeval powers.

And ancient onlookers assigned distinctive characteristics or personalities to these nearby planets and plasmas, based on their appearance, movements and changes. They were considered gods, supernatural powers that ruled the heavens, their sole habitat. The “theater of the gods,” then, was the ancient firmament overhead. In the cultures of antiquity, these planets and plasmas became human-like or animal-like gods who acted out their epoch stories on that grandiose stage.

Their identities included names, though those names varied from culture to culture. Even within a single culture, the same astral object acquired numerous names as it moved and changed over time. To modern eyes, this riotous nomenclature of ancient gods offers only confusion. To the ancients it made perfect sense since each name identified a unique aspect of their planet or plasma gods.

But the identities and attributes of those gods were strikingly similar in every cultural tradition because the look and behavior of those planets and plasmas was consistently interpreted the same way from culture to culture. This was due to the fact that the appearance and actions of these gods or powers suggested the same characteristics, natures or personalities in the minds of the ancients the world over.

For this reason, the ancients wrote and spoke of them as if they were living beings or creatures, and they so illustrated them in their sacred art. For example, Saturn (the largest of the planets seen in earthly skies) was the “father god” or “creator,” Venus came to be seen as the original “queen of heaven” or “mother goddess” and Mars became her “son,” the “hero” and the “warrior,” among many other designations. And the plasmas that were seen stretching between the planets took on a large number of identities: a connecting sky pillar, celestial tree, world mountain, astral river and ladder, stairway or path to heaven. Such commonalities allow us to identify each of the primary actors by their role in Earth’s ancient heavens and the traditions of mankind, no matter what name they went by in the various ancient cultures.

Returning once again to our reading analogy, we recall that our teacher introduced the notion that stringing several letters together produced a readable word. To read it, we used the sounds we had learned for each letter, and we were encouraged to “sound out” the more difficult words phonetically. And so we began to haltingly read our first words. “Look, Jane. See Dick run. Run, Dick, run.”

This was a bit of a tricky process. Sounding out each letter and then stringing those sounds together didn’t always produce a recognizable word. We soon learned that there were more complex rules that governed the way some groups of letters sounded. The u-g-h in “laugh” or “tough” made an “fff” sound, even though when those three stood alone they said “Ugh!” Still more complexity to master.

The corollary in learning to read prophecy is the realization that prophetic interpretation assigned a number of roles or characteristics to each of the congregate powers in the sky. For example, Venus was not only the mother goddess, she later became Mars’ crown of light, the “hand” of god, the wife of Saturn and ultimately a raging, angry goddess. One plasma conduit, stretching between Mars and Venus, was described as a dragon, beast or monster because it writhed, undulated and twisted like a snake.

And the complexity of these cosmic forms only grows and multiplies as we survey the literature and traditions of ancient cultures. These original forms, prototypes or archetypes became the basis for nearly innumerable traditional and religious narratives, and their perceived behaviors became the stuff of sacred rituals in all ancient cultures.

Mastering the use of these archetypes by understanding their astral origins allows any reader to interpret them wherever they are found: in religious ritual, in narratives such as scripture, in hieroglyphics, monumental architecture, petroglyphs or sacred symbols.

In our reading analogy, we eventually discovered that words could be grouped into sentences to complete a thought. And several sentences comprised a paragraph, a tidy group of thoughts that, when grouped together, made a summary or conveyed a concept.

In prophecy, we learn that a few simple symbols can convey whole narratives. In some cases, only one ideogram or hieroglyph invokes whole paragraphs of text.

Conversely, we learn that scriptural or religious metaphors have symbolic equivalents. This was a two-headed coin. On one side we have the symbol, and on the other we have its metaphoric equivalent. This allowed the ancients, most of whom could neither read nor write, to depict, read or relate a whole story with just a few symbols or a single ritual.

In reading, with practice came proficiency. After years of work, we mastered reading sufficient to extract meaning from any text. We were finally readers.

So, too, with deciphering prophecy. With some dedicated time and effort, we can train ourselves to read prophecy as easily as we read the morning paper.

But that was not all there was to reading. We soon learned that there were other languages. Some even used ideograms instead of an alphabet. That is, just when we think we’ve mastered it all, we discover that there are new horizons to explore.

So it is with prophetic language. Once we master the basics—the archetypes—once we learn the imagery those basics gave rise to, we can “read” any prophetic metaphor or arcane symbol as easily as we read the letters on a written page.

Of course when we reach that level, we discover to our amazement that what we have learned is only the tip of the iceberg. We quickly find that the imagery or language of prophecy is also the key to the vision of all the prophets, not just prophecy per se. And that includes the teachings of the prophet Joseph Smith. We realize, too, that it is the key to temple symbolism and ritual, both in ancient cultures and in the modern church.

We should have guessed that learning to interpret prophecy, like learning to read, would ultimately reveal sweeping vistas of knowledge and understanding beyond anything we could have imagined at the outset of our quest.

I guess we’re not dummies after all.

©Anthony E. Larson, 2009

Living the Nephite Nightmare

(An Open Letter to all Latter-day Saints)

The Book of Mormon is a prophecy for our time.

This has been my thesis since the mid-1980s, when I wrote Parallel Histories: The Nephites and The Americans. It was written over 20 years ago in response to then church president Ezra Taft Benson’s call to carefully and diligently re-examine the Book of Mormon. It was my effort to comply with his earnest request.

Following Pres. Benson’s cue when he observed that we are the modern counterparts of the ancient Nephites, I explored the thesis that our two cultures were more than superficially similar. They are remarkably alike, in profound and meaningful ways. Because it was apparent that my fellow saints weren’t seeing the things that seemed obvious to me, I felt a book was needed which outlined and elaborated that thesis.

Several articles followed over the years, updating, authenticating and validating that book and its thesis. (See the four part series A Harbinger For Our Time, on this blog.) This monograph will further that approach by demonstrating that America has now crossed the final threshold in our headlong rush to unknowingly duplicate Nephite history in our time.

When comparing the two cultures, as we will do herein, one caveat must be kept foremost in mind: While the two histories are similar, displaying similar conditions and events, the two cultures, Nephite and American, are fundamentally different from one another. The resemblance or similarities may be profoundly significant, but the way events played out in Nephite times is unlikely to be identical to the way events play out in our time.

These differences are important to keep in mind. Don’t expect an exact fit. Theirs was a simpler, agrarian-based society; ours is far more complex, based in a largely industrialized and technology oriented society. Their theater was restricted to a regional one; ours is national and international in scope, with many factors that were nonexistent in Nephite times. Thus, events in the two histories must be compared carefully—allowing that each will unfold in different ways, yet they will display remarkable and significant similarities.

In this monograph, we move beyond the astonishing similarities identified in the original book’s presentation. We move beyond the resemblance of the last Lamanite/Nephite War to our Second World War. We move beyond the postwar economic boom that enriched both nations in their respective eras. We move beyond the identical moral and political corruption that ensued. We look beyond the ideological battles that characterized the campaign of the corrupt judges against Nephi, the son of Helaman and their similarities to the Clinton presidency. We look beyond the Gadianton wars and equivalencies that allowed the accurate prediction that today’s terrorists would become our counterpart to the Nephite’s Gadianton robbers during the Clinton and Bush presidencies.

Now we come to the crux of this monograph, the next major parallel between our two cultures. It is the failed internal struggle the Nephites fought to retain their representative form of government, complete with its freedoms and justice.

The Nephite culture had been governed for generations by a representative form remarkably similar to our own. Mosiah said it best: “Therefore, choose you by the voice of this people, judges, that ye may be judged according to the laws which have been given you by our fathers, which are correct, and which were given them by the hand of the Lord.

“Now it is not common that the voice of the people desireth anything contrary to that which is right; but it is common for the lesser part of the people to desire that which is not right; therefore this shall ye observe and make it your law—to do your business by the voice of the people.” (Mosiah 29: 25, 26.)

Mosiah’s observation later proved prophetic in the days of Third Nephi: it is nearly always a minority that wants to venture away from correct principles of governance. The time came, as it always does, when wealth led to pride and a division of Nephite society into classes, “… and some were lifted up unto pride and boastings because of their exceedingly great riches, yea, even unto great persecutions.” (3 Nephi 6:10.)

Social equality dissolved. “And the people began to be distinguished by ranks, according to their riches … for there were many merchants in the land, and also many lawyers, and many officers. … thus there became a great inequality in all the land.” (Ibid. 6: 12, 11, 14.)

Immediately, the wealthy, ruling class within the Nephite nation decided that they wanted to set aside government by the voice of the people and replace it with a monarchy, which would be indebted, naturally, to those of their elite status: “And they did set at defiance the law and the rights of their country … and to establish a king over the land, that the land should no more be at liberty but should be subject unto kings.” (Ibid. 6:30.)

Something strikingly similar seems to be happening before our very eyes today, though no one is trying to set up a monarchy. They don’t need to. The governing class has seen to it that our presidents will be “elected” from their ranks simply because a man of the people has no chance in the corrupt system set up by our politicians in the last half-century. A ruling class of elites, who have no desire to relinquish power, has infiltrated our two party system. They have set rules that make it nearly impossible to unseat them.

The will of the people is no longer of any concern to them. Progressivism (the newspeak term coined to replace the pejorative moniker, “Liberal”) has come to dominate Washington, with its doctrine that the “experts” from the elite social strata—such as corporate heads (“merchants” in Nephite times), politicians (“lawyers” and “priests” in Nephite times) and government officials (“officers” in Nephite times)—should make decisions for us.

When recent protests, populated by ordinary, mainstream Americans, erupted around this country in order to make their voices heard, those who govern and their media minions angrily derided, denounced and dismissed them as dangerously misguided malcontents. So it was in Nephite times when “those who were angered were chiefly the chief judges, and they who had been high priests and lawyers; yea, all those who were lawyers were angry with those who testified of these things.” (Ibid. 6: 21.)

Third Nephi records how it transpired in his day. “And they [the angry chief judges, high priests and lawyers] did enter into a covenant one with another … to combine against all righteousness.” (Ibid. 6: 28.)

Many in our day have made the same decision. They espouse the philosophy that God should have nothing to do with government, in spite of the fact that the founding fathers made just the opposite affirmation. Today’s ideologues obviously seek to constrain religion in any way possible, insisting that the people not allow it to have any part in the operation of their government, that there should be an impregnable firewall between government and religion so that governance cannot be informed by any religious creed or hegemony.

Religion has become the enemy of the Progressives in our day. They make every effort to marginalize and demean people of faith. In effect, those with this secular bent seek to divorce this nation from its religious or sectarian roots, “… to combine against all righteousness.”

The net effect of this initiative among the Nephite cultural elite was clearly manifest. “And they did set at defiance the law and the rights of their country … that the land should no more be at liberty …” (Ibid. 6: 30.)

Something appallingly similar seems to be afoot in our nation today. While politicians give flowery lip service to individual rights, public service and moral rectitude, their personal behavior is often just the opposite. Presidential associates and appointees, for example, are found to hold opinions that are blatantly contrary to constitutional principals and morality, some even openly condemn America and its traditional values. Hypocrisy seems rampant in both political parties. None seem trustworthy any longer.

The good news for us, perhaps, is that the chief judges, high priests and lawyers in Nephite times failed in their endeavor. No Nephite king was enthroned. This bodes well for the outcome of our similar state of affairs. But the net effect of the struggle utterly demolished their government, and it threatens to do so to ours as well.

Will this be our fate? “And the people were divided one against another; and they did separate one from another into tribes, every man according to his family and his kindred and friends; and thus they did destroy the government of the land.” (3 Nephi 7: 2.)

Yet, there was no warfare: “… there were no wars as yet among them.” (Ibid. 7: 5.) However, what we have certainly feels like a war, a contest of wills for power and supremacy, where the ammunition is words and the casualties are truth and justice.

But “the regulations of the government were destroyed, … and they did cause great contention in the land.” (3 Nephi 7: 7.)

Contention is the order of the day in Washington. Our government seems to be descending into chaos amid an extraordinary level of acrimony and controversy. There is an unprecedented rush to pass questionable legislation, without due deliberation and consideration. No one, including the legislators themselves in some cases, seems to know what provisions legislation contains or what it will cost. Our economy is staggering. Unemployment is rising. Our leaders are sending conflicting messages to us, to our allies and to our enemies.

Our condition bears ominous similarities to that of the Nephites.
“And thus six years had not passed away since the more part of the people had turned from their righteousness, like the dog to his vomit, or like the sow to her wallowing in the mire.” (3 Nephi 7: 8.)

Numerous pundits have commented on how quickly we have turned from our constitutional roots in recent years. We’ve done an about-face almost as quickly as did our Nephite cousins. They united to defeat terrorism, in the form of the Gadianton robbers, in their time. Then, in a handful of years, they tore their nation apart from within.

While the terrorist attack on the World Trade Towers immediately brought us together as a nation, speaking with one voice, subsequent events have moved rapidly to undermine our culture and our government. Like the Nephites, we have gone from united to divided in a few, short years. It seems apparent that if we continue on our present course, our nation will suffer a fate equally grievous to that of the Nephites.

Surely the inclusion of this tragic saga in the Nephite narrative was meant to warn us that we would suffer a similar outcome in our day. Surely, Mormon meant us to clearly see our time in this highly polished Nephite mirror.

Will we, too, live the Nephite nightmare?

This viewpoint, provided by an analysis of Nephite history, allows us to sort out the truth, to see through the subterfuge, confusion and contradiction that dominate our present political discourse. The media, the politicians and the pundits cannot misguide those of us who take the Book of Mormon as our guide. It provides a certain compass we can use to steer a course through the present and coming chaos. It is the “more sure word of prophecy,’ as Peter put it.

Given this perspective, no LDS politician who truly believes the Book of Mormon to be the word of God can, in good conscience, support the present movement away from constitutional principles where “the voice of the people” governs. He or she would have to first dismiss the Book of Mormon as irrelevant to our time. He or she would have to deny the God given rights that Nephite prophets declared were vested in the people. In effect, they would have to ignore the Book of Mormon, the very cornerstone of our religion.

I am well aware that my position will infuriate some Latter-day Saints. So be it. It was so with those who sought to undermine freedom and agency in Nephite times; it will be so now. Those who are so angered thereby betray their perfidy.
At the same time, this discourse will strike a chord of recognition in those who truly embrace the Book of Mormon and the Restored Gospel. They will see the remarkable similarities that mark the two histories, and they will want to do something about it.

So, you may ask, “What can I do?” The answer is both easy and hard.
First, as a believing Mormon, your concept of the sanctity of agency requires that you get involved—“anxiously engaged” is the Lord’s terminology. Of that I am certain.

But what I cannot tell you is ‘what’ you should do. You must make that determination for yourself. All I can add is to suggest you follow the counsel of Pres. Spencer W. Kimball: “Do it … now!”

We Latter-day Saints have not heeded the lessons chiseled in the Nephite record. We failed to take note of a vital part of that sacred witness, meant to warn us of our national folly. The diligence of those ancient prophets, who patiently carved their crucial message on precious plates of gold, the determination of a modern prophet to publish their revelation to the world at all odds and the repeated efforts of recent church leaders counseling us to re-read the Book of Mormon, saying that the church is under condemnation for failure to do so, has been set at naught by our indolence. We have the ignominious misfortune of watching the government of our nation self-destruct before our very eyes, just as did the Nephites, while we scarcely lift a finger to oppose it, let alone rush to save our Constitution. That sacred document has too long hung by a thread while we dally. As a result, the forces of evil and darkness are rapidly moving to grind it under the unforgiving foot of oppression and tyranny.

The time for mincing words is far past. It is time to declare our allegiance—either to God, agency and freedom or to watch our great nation follow those that have preceded us onto the scrapheap of failed nations down through history.

What happens next is too terrible to contemplate. If you care to know the details of what awaits us just around the corner, read 3 Nephi, chapter 8. And don’t think it couldn’t happen to us; every prophet since the beginning of time, including the Savior himself, has predicted our fate. Read it, O Zion, and weep, O Israel. Judgement is now at our doorstep.

© Anthony E. Larson, 2009

Prop 8 and a Warning From Our Past

“Those who can not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” George Santayana, American philosopher

Recent political events have focused considerable negative attention on the LDS church, designating Mormons as the primary opponents to same-sex marriage initiatives across the country. Battle lines were drawn in California’s ballot initiative, Proposition 8, restricting the definition of marriage to a union between a man and a woman, effectively eliminating the right to same-sex marriage.

Due to the church’s stand for traditional marriage in that contest, it has since come under attack by the gay and lesbian community. Since the election, rancorous protests and demonstrations have singled out Mormons. Some of our temples and chapels have been defaced, individual Latter-day Saints have been accosted and the church has been demonized in the media by elements of the secular progressive movement.

Because we are in the forefront of the struggle to prohibit same-sex marriages, the gay community has used that as a rallying point against Mormons, declaring us bigoted and “unfair.” Political pressures are likely to escalate as the gay movement in the country continues to gather allies and strength in its push to achieve legitimacy and legal status.

Reflecting upon these recent events, Latter-day Saints would be well advised to recall another time, in the early days of the church, when such political opposition caused us great harm.

Look at our Nauvoo period. From the outset, the Saints had been well received by Illinois residents. Politicians, especially, were eager to court the Mormon vote, as they have been in our recent history.

The new city soon experienced exceptional growth as the highly successful missionary work in England sent converts by the boatload to the small Illinois settlement. The influx of converts overwhelmed the burgeoning frontier city. Joseph Smith and the Brethren were hard put to find room for all of them. Nauvoo eventually became more populous than Chicago.

Exceptional growth has also been a hallmark of the modern church since the early 1960s when Pres. David O McKay articulated the “every member a missionary” program. Since then, our numbers have grown dramatically from just over 1 million in 1961 to over 13 million or more today.

In 1992, a book entitled The American Religion by Harold Bloom, a literary and religion critic, examined Mormonism’s rapid growth. He wrote:

The nation will not always be only two percent Mormon. The Saints outlive the rest of us, have more children than all but a few American groups, and convert on a grand scale, both here and abroad. I do not know what figures they project for their increase, in the next generation, but my own guess is that by the year 2020 (when I will not be here), they could well form at least ten percent of our population, and probably rather more than that. Their future is immense … Salt Lake City may yet become the religious capital of the United States. (The American Religion, p.113.)

As Nauvoo, the beautiful city by the Mississippi, grew, so did tensions between the Saints and their neighbors. History repeated itself. Every time the Prophet and his people established roots — New York, Kirtland, Jackson County and now Nauvoo — they were ultimately despised and rejected by their neighbors.

Of course, every Mormon knows the tragedy at the heart of this story. The tide turned once again. The eventual outcome was the expulsion of the Saints from Illinois.

Could we experience a similar outcome today?

As with the Nauvoo Saints, today’s church has more political influence in the nation than its burgeoning membership would seem to indicate. Bloom recognized that reality. “Mormon financial and political power is exerted in Washington to a degree far beyond what one would expect from one voter in fifty.”

Our current political and financial power, brought to bear in the Prop 8 battle, is partly responsible for our present predicament. By affirming our belief in traditional marriage and putting our financial and political clout behind that doctrinal stance, we’ve once again made ourselves a target.

Like our predecessors in Nauvoo, remarkable growth coupled with our unique doctrinal views has thrust us into the political spotlight. Doctrinal issues certainly played a part in the Mormon expulsion from Nauvoo and would likely have a role in any future clash between Mormons and our neighbors. (An ironic correspondence: The doctrinal flashpoint in the Nauvoo period was polygamy; today, it is the sanctity of traditional marriage.)

Already other rival religious groups in America have labeled Mormonism a “cult,” thus downgrading our status in the eyes of their membership such that persecution of Mormons and our religion becomes more acceptable — even a sacred duty. Thus, Mormons are beneath contempt.

Thus far, sectarian abuse is only verbal and intellectual, but it could easily escalate. Add the in-your-face tactics of the gay community, which is infamous for its confrontational methods, and you have a volatile combination.

Today’s activist factions have taken lessons from the anti-war protestors and civil rights demonstrators of the 1960s and 70s. They’ve carefully observed the success the environmental extremists have had using the courts, beginning in the 1980s. Today’s gay rights activists employ all those lessons learned.

They will not go away, they will persist. The trend is already gaining momentum, in spite of noble opposition. In due time, Americans will be cowed and coerced by these tactics, if history is any indicator. Thus, the time will certainly come when same sex marriage will be given legal status in one state after another, until it becomes accepted nationwide.

What then? Those who oppose them will be branded as bigots and homophobes for wanting to deny civil rights to a segment of the populace. The tide will have turned. Once again, the Saints will see an emboldened movement rise up against us, empowered by law and the crushing authority of the state. It will then be forced upon us, and we will certainly be made to suffer, as did our forebears.

There will certainly be dissentions within the church. Out of fear of persecution, personal harm and reprisals for their beliefs, many will deny the faith. Those who stand firm will see themselves disenfranchised.

This eventuality has menacing implications and stunning echoes of the Nauvoo tragedy. Religious intolerance in that instance went hand-in-hand with political and social intolerance. Indeed, our stance today could consolidate otherwise disparate elements of American society to create an unholy alliance that would then present a united front against us.

Such a confrontation would take the shape and form it took in the Nauvoo period, pitting the church against other American institutions, the Mormons against their fellow Americans.

According to the statements in his book, Bloom believes “the twenty-first century will mark a full-scale return to the wars of religion.” Of course, that is what happened first in Jackson County and then in Nauvoo — a war of religion that cost Mormons dearly.

There are those who might say that such a thing could not happen in a time when such obvious prejudice and bigotry are nearly nonexistent, that the law cannot be perverted as it was over a century ago on the American frontier. But those who so believe ignore the lessons of history, and are thus doomed to repeat its mistakes.

This is the heart of the issue at hand. Today’s members could find themselves faced with a similar predicament to that of the early Saints in Nauvoo. The commonalities between the Nauvoo experience and the present are too significant to be ignored.

© Anthony E. Larson, 2008

Easter

Most Christians vaguely grasp the connections between Easter and Passover. What most do not understand are the deep roots both holidays have in paganism and Saturnian symbolism. However, such knowledge serves to explain much of the tradition and ritual surrounding this Christian holiday.

A Christian holiday

Easter celebrates the death and resurrection of the Savior in the meridian of time. Mormons, like the rest of Christianity, see the holiday as a time to remember and reverence that most sacred and remarkable event in all of history.

The entire philosophy of Christianity hinges on the resurrection. Without it, Christianity — and by inference, Mormonism as well — is just another religious philosophy among many. With the resurrection comes the promise that all will rise from the grave, Christ being the first fruits. This concept is at the heart of our religion.

The Passover connection

Easter’s connection with the Passover stems from the fact that the Savior’s crucifixion and resurrection in Jerusalem took place during the annual Jewish Passover celebration, a juxtaposition that was not lost on the Savior since he clearly chose the time and the place of his own expiation.

Seen from the catastrophist’s point of view, the Passover was a celebration of Israelite deliverance — not just from Egyptian bondage, but the entire planet from planetary catastrophe. Passover was the moment of closest approach between Earth and the comet Venus, hence the term “pass over.” It was the culmination of a series of plagues that afflicted not only Egypt, but also the entire world, according to Velikovsky.

So, too, in Christian eyes, Easter is a celebration of the deliverance of the human race from the bonds of death.

Both Easter and Passover involve the consumption of a ritual meal in remembrance of their deliverance. The Jewish Seder reflects the Lord’s directive that the Israelites eat roast lamb, unleavened bread and bitter herbs. (Exodus 12:8-10.) They do so to remember how they were saved from the plague that took so many Egyptians during the Exodus. The Christian sacrament reflects Christ’s instruction that they partake of bread and wine to remember him and the deliverance from death he has provided. (Luke 22:19, 20.)

A note, in passing

Incidentally, it may be noteworthy, in passing, that there may have been a very practical purpose for the consumption of the Passover meal. If, as Velikovsky suggests, Earth’s atmosphere was supercharged with elements from the tail of the passing comet Venus, then eating bread without yeast and bitter herbs may have served to offset the debilitating physical effects on the human body of those pollutants. If, as this author suggests, the compounds that turned the water red in Egypt were acidic, causing sickness and death in animals and humans, then the basic, alkaline nature of bitter herbs would serve to chemically offset the elevated levels of acid in the body (acidosis).

Additionally, it is well known that certain types of yeast (Candida albicans, for example) in the gut can release toxins that can severely debilitate the immune system. Other types of yeast produce compounds that can cause humans to hallucinate. In this instance, the instructions to eat bread without yeast (unleavened) may have been designed to help the Israelites better cope physically with the temporarily hostile environment created by the extraterrestrial pollutants — eminently practical advice given through revelation from God to Moses. The idea of food as medicine is one that modern science has recently come to recognize, a philosophy that has been at the heart of herbal use and practices since time immemorial.

Eating is a religious experience?

Such ritual meals as Seder, the Eucharist and the Sacrament are also practiced in most pagan cultures. They range, on one end of the spectrum, from consumption of simple foods to cannibalism on the other extreme.

Most animal sacrifice did not consist of cremation, as most moderns believe. Rather, it was, in most cases, a ritual method of cooking and preparing the animal for eating. Our modern, seemingly innocuous and strictly culinary practice of barbequing actually has its roots in cultural traditions of sacrifice. So remember, next time you throw something on the ‘barbie,’ you are practicing the time-honored, ritualistic tradition of sacrifice with its roots deep in antiquity.

Recidivist Israelites, too, adopted pagan eating rituals. "The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods, that they may provoke me to anger." (Jeremiah 7:18.)

Note the similarity between the elements of this ritual and the Christian sacrament. They consumed bread and drink in honor of the goddess. It was a ritual meal. These backsliding Israelites prepared cakes and drink to honor their pagan gods, just as we take bread and water today. Such similarities are not coincidental. Christ, on the eve of his crucifixion, obviously turned to a well-established, ancient practice in the Hebrew culture as the basis for his new eating ritual, the Sacrament.

Hot cross buns

Just such a ritual meal is connected with the Christian’s celebration of Easter. Hot cross buns are a lesser, but well established part of this holiday that, doubtlessly, have their origins in pagan antiquity. These loaves were originally marked with horns, the crescent symbol for ancient Saturn, or the cross, the cruciform symbol for the Queen of Heaven, Astarte or Venus. The ancient Greeks also consumed these types of buns in their celebrations of Artemis, Goddess of the hunt (known as Diana to the Romans). And the Egyptians ate a similar cake in their worship of the Goddess Isis. Later, Saxons ate buns that were marked with a cross in honor of Eastre (Astarte). These customs of creating a ceremonial bread or loaf, marking it with the symbol of the goddess, then eating it as part of a festival in honor of that same goddess is an echo of the Israelite practice of making cakes to their Queen of Heaven.

Such universal practices beg the question, where did the human race get the idea that eating something was a sacred practice? The idea that eating should be part of religious ritual may have begun in Earth’s ancient heavens when one planet ‘consumed’ other, smaller satellites. In a later monograph, we will discuss more about sacrificial rituals around the world and the events and beliefs that may have inspired the practice.

A Christian or pagan holiday?

Returning to our Easter theme, it seems rather ironic that this ostensibly Christian holiday is burdened with much of the celebration and ceremony that once attached itself to the ancient cults that worshipped astral goddesses.

We discover, for instance, that the very name of the holiday has its roots in idolatry. Easter is a corruption of the name of the goddess who leant her name to the holiday, Aster or Astarte, as the Greeks knew her. Her Syro-Phoenician counterpart was the goddess Ashtoreth. The Babylonians called her Ishtar and the Romans called her Venus. She was also the great mother goddess of the Saxon people in Northern Europe, who knew her as Eastre, from whence we get the name Easter today.

The Saturn connection

Surely these ancient goddesses from a variety of ancient cultures all had their origins in the planet Venus that once stood near the Earth in the Polar Configuration because they all share common attributes, history, and iconography. Talbott wrote:

Wherever you find the Universal Monarch (Saturn) you will find close at hand the ancient mother goddess — the goddess whom the Sumerians called Inanna, the Queen of Heaven, and the Babylonians Ishtar, and the Egyptians Isis, Hathor, and Sekhmet, each with numerous counterparts in their own and in other lands, and virtually all of them viewed symbolically as daughter or spouse of the creator-king, and the mother of another, equally prominent figure.

The Mother Goddess is the planet Venus, the luminous, central orb seen squarely in the center of Saturn and from which radiating streams of material course outward. (Thoth, Vol. 2, No. 8.)

So, we see that the true origins of this most Christian of holidays actually owes its existence to events that transpired in Earth ancient heavens.

The Easter egg

Originally, the egg, now a cultural symbol of Easter, was closely related to the eye symbol — both symbols of this mother goddess, this goddess of fertility anciently. Mythical traditions say that she was born as/or in a celestial egg. Indeed, in the Polar Configuration, Venus’ transformation into the prototypical star — the archetype of all radiant star symbols — began when it took on an ovoid shape, thus forever connecting the goddess with the egg.


It is for this reason that the favored decoration for Easter eggs anciently was a star. Indeed, the very name of this goddess in several cultures, as well as our own, came to mean ‘star.’

Yet, in our culture, stars and the eggs have no discernable relationship. Like so much in mythology, the connection seems absurd to the modern mind. Yet, in ancient myth and tradition they are intimately connected. Only the theory of the Polar Configuration satisfactorily explains their symbolic ligature. Indeed, it not only explains it; it demands it. The star and the egg were two primary aspects or phases in the development of ancient Venus while in the Polar Configuration at the dawn of time.

Dyed eggs, originally colored to match the turquoise color of ancient Venus, were part of the rituals enacted in the Babylonian mystery religions. The variety of colors we see today was a natural, artistic elaboration of the original idea. Such colorfully dyed and decorated eggs were considered sacred because of their symbolic representation of the ancient goddess/planet Venus. They played an integral part of the religious ceremonies in Egypt and the Orient. Dyed eggs were hung in Egyptian temples. The egg was regarded as the emblem of regenerative life proceeding from the mouth of the great Egyptian god Atum because the actual planet Venus so presented itself in the Polar Configuration. Venus (Hathor) was centered on Saturn (Atum), assumed an egg shape that seemed to house the child, Mars (Horus) and then appeared to give birth to Mars.

The Easter rabbit

In addition to the egg symbol, the Norse goddess of fertility, Ostara, whose name was clearly a derivative of Aster or Astarte, was connected to the hare. This connection was a later one, unique to the Norse culture, which probably stems from the well-known fecundity of rabbits.

Three other seemingly disconnected traditions of Easter further connect the holiday to pagan practices and ultimately to the Polar Configuration: the woman’s Easter bonnet and special holiday dress as well as the Easter parade.

Easter bonnets and finery

Festivals that celebrated the ancient star goddess, Venus, were ideal occasions for women, who sought to emulate the goddess, to adorn themselves as the goddess herself. The bonnet worn today is a distant replication of the hat, hair dress or crown worn by the goddess in heaven.


Older, more customary variants of the bonnet draped a veil across the face, also a feature of the ancient sky goddess. LDS temple-goers will recognize the validity of this tradition and its connection to temple ritual and furnishings. The dress, usually white, was designed with symbolic significance relevant to the ancient appearance of Venus and her role as a fertility goddess. Thus, anything that enhanced the gender specific attributes of a woman was employed to demonstrate her procreative role. Indeed, the more elaborate, yet accurate, the duplication of the symbols/appearance — because the symbols of the goddess were representations of what she looked like in Earth’s ancient heavens — the greater the identification of the individual with the mother goddess, imitating her essential aspects. Thus, a practice that had deep religious significance in antiquity has come to be a mere fashion statement today. Such is the dilution of the original concepts and practices over time. Yet, the themes persist in our cultural traditions, outliving, by far, the knowledge and understanding they were meant to convey.

The Easter parade

Parading up and down the streets, carrying an effigy of the god or goddess upon their shoulders, the ancients moved from one strategically sited temple location to another to re-enact the mythical movements of their deity in the heavens anciently. In many cultures — especially the Egyptian — these portable shrines were set in replicas of boats, carried on long, stout poles that could be borne by several carriers. It is the image of the god or goddess, sitting in a celestial boat, that we commonly see in ancient Egyptian art. It is for this reason that we apply the term “float” to our modern version of these icons that move along city streets in modern parades. They were originally boats; so calling them floats is natural.

Additionally, it is the reason the term “ark” was applied to the most sacred object in Judaism, the Ark of the Covenant. It was applied to the conveyance that bore tablets containing the Ten Commandments and other artifacts of the Exodus.
Thus, the Easter parade is a modern counterpart of this ancient practice. Once again, our culture maintains the practices or traditions instigated in Earth’s ancient skies with no concept or grasp of their origins or original meanings.

Christian hypocrisy

Ironically, modern Christians, who seem so determined to avoid any suggestion of paganism or cultism in their religions, who vociferously denounce the paganism of Christmas and Mormons as cultists, have enthusiastically embraced the paganism of Easter.

Latter-day Saints, too, fail to recognize the astral traditions in our culture and religion, yet it should not be so. Joseph Smith and the prophets that succeeded him sought to connect us to our ancient past and the traditions handed down through cultural transmission. Sadly, we Saints discarded our understanding of these things in favor of the Christianized customs and practices of the American culture. Yet, like our Christian cousins, our traditions, our temples and our scriptures are filled with the evidence from the past of their true cosmological nature.

© Anthony E. Larson, 2002

Doomsday Anxiety

A fear of the end of the world, a sort of ‘doomsday anxiety,’ may be the source of the resistance nearly all Latter-day Saints demonstrate when confronted with the planetary catastrophe scenario of the last days, prophetic imagery and ancient history taught in these pages.

It is a syndrome that afflicts everyone to one degree or another.

The answer to many gospel questions

Given the ability of the catastrophe scenario to explain so much — the imagery found in the scriptures and modern revelation, the iconography of modern temples, the mythology, religion and traditions of every ancient culture, as well as that of our own, and the seemingly extravagant statements of Joseph Smith that find meaning only when placed in the planetary catastrophe scenario — one would think that the Saints might rush to embrace these concepts.

But, just the opposite is true. Their reactions range from confusion to apathetic disbelief to overt skepticism or even outright antagonism.

Unwarranted reactions

Otherwise rational and thoughtful Mormons exhibit abnormal responses to these ideas. Most become uneasy when these concepts are introduced into any discussion. They are clearly conflicted emotionally about the concepts that confront them. Others seem to have difficulty following the concepts and quickly become distracted. Still others see no relevance to the gospel and soon lose interest or become bored.

A psychological cause?

It may seem odd to suggest that all these are emotional reactions, yet they mirror the reactions listed by psychologists for victims of amnesia when they are confronted with a painful truth or reality. Velikovsky, a psychologist by training and profession, saw these as forms of amnesia because the range of reactions is the same.

The Latter-day Saints’ resistance to concepts that they should otherwise easily recognize as invaluable aids to their gospel study and comprehension is puzzling. The natural assumption that these reactions are the result of exposure to unfamiliar ideas that seem illogical at first glance may be unsound. It may be precisely because they are too familiar that individuals react as they do.

The explanation may lie beyond the veil.

First of all, it’s worth noting that logic always takes a back seat to emotional, internal conflicts. Psychologists tell us that powerful emotional reactions always trump clear-headed thinking. It is for this reason that people who are normally clear headed and logical will act irrationally in certain situations. The heart rules the head, as folk wisdom tells us.

Let’s look at this carefully.

Knowledge from the preexistence

Numerous general authorities have described the process of conversion to the Restored Gospel as a “remembering” of the things we knew in the preexistence. Every human being who came to this world learned those gospel truths in that premortal epoch.

At birth, a veil of forgetfulness hid that knowledge and those experiences from our conscious thought. But it is our individual dedication to those innate principles acquired in our preexistence that make each of us what and who we are. That’s why we are drawn by an emotional bond or component to those principles and truths.

Knowledge is blocked, but emotions come through

The knowledge gained in our prior existence is inaccessible to us, due to the veil. But the old spirit within us, which has been in existence forever, reacts to that knowledge, producing emotions in us that we, in turn, act upon. For example, we are emotionally drawn to the plan of salvation because it is familiar to our spirit, while our conscious mind sees only a new and unusual concept.

This accounts for the reactions of investigators to gospel principles. We often refer to it as revelation from the Spirit. But it may be that it is simply that eternal part of us that recognizes the truths of the gospel and reacts to them. Thus, the spirit within us is confirming to us that what we are seeing and hearing is the truth.

Of course, the positive reactions vary in each individual, running the gamut from “whisperings of the spirit” to overwhelming “hit over the head” responses. The workings within us we call “conscience” or “intuition” are most likely of the same nature.

Positive for the good, negative for the bad

For those spirits who have innately followed those preexistent precepts and who therefore wish to embrace these recognized truths and conform their life to them, the experience is affirmative. Encountering the truth once again in this life is a confirming, uplifting experience accompanied by strong, positive emotions. They want to know more; they instinctively recognize the value of the gospel as their one, sure guide, as they learned in the preexistence.

For those who find their behavior in this world is at odds with those preexistent precepts, who have deluded themselves by suppressing their spirit’s urge to act circumspectly, who have systematically denied the warnings of their spirit called “conscience” and who wish to continue to indulge in the worldly lusts and pursuits they find so attractive, such an encounter with truth provokes a violent, negative reaction within them, ranging, as we have seen from confused indifference to outright anger. Hence, they seek to destroy the message by attacking the messenger. Many prophets have lost their lives due to these negative responses manifest by large, wayward segments of the human population in all ages.

As with the gospel, so with prophecy

These same principles apply when individuals are exposed to the concepts of planetary catastrophe.

During our preexistence, we all saw the way these events played out in other creations. We all vicariously experienced what would surely occur on the world we would one day inhabit. Thus, we had a firsthand knowledge of the nature and extent of what we might one day encounter in mortality.

So, when a comet appears in the sky or the sun is darkened in an eclipse, that part of us that is eternal, our spirit, recalls that these are earmarks of great planetary disasters. Even when someone begins to rehearse the imagery of such events, we can become uneasy, and we are filled with dread — an emotion we could not experience in the preexistence, but which is endemic to our present condition.

This is the doomsday anxiety syndrome.

Attack the messenger if you don’t like the message

The connections rehearsed by this author in his books, articles and in these pages — stories of planetary catastrophe in ancient history, cultural tradition and ritual, gospel symbolism and the language of the prophets — evoke the same reaction.

Some few embrace the information because it “rings true.” Others, even some who have wholeheartedly embraced the Restored Gospel and its marvelous truths, have a negative reaction — not because they aren’t good people, but because they subconsciously fear that the planetary catastrophe scenario might suddenly hurdle them out of their comfortable, safe existence into a scene of chaos, unimaginable destruction and even death. Unconscious of the deep motivation for their feeling, they recoil from both the message and the messenger as powerful emotions arising from within their spirit work to block the reality of what they are seeing or hearing by creating a confusion of thought, denying the truth in all of it or reacting angrily to it. Depending upon the individual, they display the spectrum of familiar responses psychologists expect to anything the individual sees as profoundly fearful and unthinkable.

Mankind in amnesia

These are the classic reactions of an amnesiac. The one thing an amnesia victim cannot deal with rationally is a confrontation with the reality that was so painful, the truth that his or her mind blocked out entirely. They are in denial. In fact, when seen in this light, we discover that denial is simply a more mild form of amnesia.

But whether you call it denial or amnesia, the results are the same: The individual cannot rationally confront and deal with something because powerful emotional forces absolutely prevent it.

Rather than seeing the reaction of most Saints to this topic as an irrational quirk of the human species, it should be seen as a perfectly normal response in an eternal being, and it serves to explain why otherwise prudent and rational Mormons suddenly exhibit signs of denial that run the gambit whenever the subject of planetary catastrophe emerges as it relates to the gospel.

Remembering means acting out

This amnesia-like behavior alone explains the proclivity of the human race to incessantly and compulsively rehearse the dramas and symbols of the planetary gods in literature, art, architecture, religion and drama. Psychologists are well acquainted with the emotional phenomenon. Children, for example, will repeatedly act out some traumatic event in their play activities, rehearsing one aspect or another of the trauma in a range of behaviors that vary from simply odd to very self destructive, depending upon the severity of the original ordeal. This explains why Aztec priests would cut the hearts from their sacrificial victims and present them as offerings to placate their vengeful planetary gods. It explains why all our holidays and festivals — Halloween, Christmas, New Year, May Day and Easter, all copies of ancient celebrations — religiously preserve the symbols, rites and rituals of cosmic upheaval.

It is no exaggeration to say that we, like our ancestors are obsessed with these things without recognizing their origins or their true meaning. Like amnesiacs, we act out or fears in self-destructive ways. Instead of acknowledging to ourselves the ugly, fearful truth, we find ways to sublimate the emotions of fear and anxiety these festivals memorialize, choosing instead to embrace them as joyous or celebratory occasions in keeping with our near total denial of their true meaning. Thus, every such festival has it rituals, which are ceremonies, rites, practices and customs that rehearse the symbolic elements of the catastrophe that initiated the festival.

Hiding the truth in plain sight

All this is a way to act out our deepest fears without once confronting the truth behind the festive facade. These holidays and festivals are like hideous monsters that we have festooned with flowers and decorative treatments to completely hide the ugliness, so we can pretend there is nothing ominous or fearful there. But, it continues to repeatedly manifest itself.

Ironically, modern, orthodox science represents the ultimate intellectual manifestation of such denial. First, science totally rejected religion, the primary guardian of the ancient knowledge of planetary catastrophe and its principle vehicles for transmitting that knowledge down through the ages: the scriptures and temple worship. Then, it banned all ancient tradition as fabrication and folly, replacing it with its own doctrine of denial: Empiricism — if you can’t see it happening now, it never happened. In fact, one might characterize the empirical method as the most certain way to avoid the truth, positing a myriad of “theories,” a kind of “scientific mythology,” rather than acknowledging the unthinkable.

The flawed notion that archaic memories of universal catastrophe were nothing more than exaggerated accounts of local disasters, as scientists and scholars have steadfastly declared, is unsupportable — another attempt at denial. Consider the profound nature of these past events.

A review of our traditions of doomsday

The world-ending catastrophe remembered by Nordic cultures gave rise to the prophetic vision of Ragnarok — the destruction of the world in a rain of fire and stone. In this vision, the great serpent Jormungand rises from the waters of the deep and attacks, spitting its fiery venom upon the world. A battle ensues between gods and giants. Odin’s dark angels, the Valkyries, ride their steeds across the sky, their golden hair streaming behind them. The walls of the heavenly city Asgard fall down, and the celestial bridge of Bifrost dissolves in flames.

A much earlier account of universal disaster, preserved by the Greek poet Hesiod, described the “clash of the Titans.” On one side, the leader of the Titans was the god Kronos, the original ruler of heaven, on the other, his own son, Zeus. Their war in the sky brought the world to the edge of complete destruction.

“For a long time now, the Titan gods and those who were descended from Kronos had fought each other, with heart-hurting struggles, ranged in opposition all through the hard encounters,” wrote Hesiod. The upheaval lasted for ten years, culminating in a heaven-shattering conflagration, when the whole world shuddered beneath the thunderbolts of the gods. The celestial combatants “threw their re-echoing weapons and the noise of either side outcrying went up to the starry heaven as with great war crying they drove at each other.”

No wonder the human race declines to acknowledge the reality of such prodigious destructions. To eyewitnesses of these events, “it absolutely would have seemed as if Earth and the wide Heaven above her had collided, for such would have been the crash arising as Earth wrecked and the sky came piling down on top of her, so vast was the crash heard as the gods collided in battle….” Huge thunderbolts flew between the celestial combatants. The roaring wind and quaking earth brought with them electrical discharge, causing a great dust storm on the Earth, “with thunder and with lightning, and the blazing thunderbolt, the weapons thrown by great Zeus” in the heavens.

Of course, the scriptural equivalent of these traditions is the battle in heaven where Michael and his archangels struggled to save all creation from Lucifer, the dragon, and his minions — the same imagery the prophets use to typify the rebellion that took place in our premortal existence.

Doomsday anxiety, the worldly view and the LDS view

The worldwide doomsday theme has no roots in familiar natural events. Therefore, we cannot ignore the direct implication: The myths arose as imaginative interpretations of extraordinary, destructive occurrences suffered by all. If mankind’s doomsday anxiety was provoked by events no longer occurring, the conventional historians’ dismissive approach to the subject must be counted among the greatest theoretical mistakes in modern times, born of profound denial.

So, too, it would be an oversight to dismiss the Saints’ disdain for this subject as benighted ignorance and not recognize it for the natural reaction that it is.

While the doomsday anxiety phenomenon is otherwise difficult to explain, it is quite understandable and logical in the context of LDS doctrine. As with most of the important questions in life, we now see that there is a clear answer in the revealed gospel.

© Anthony E. Larson, 2005

The Origin of the Sacrament

Mormons partake of the Sacrament in remembrance of the Savior’s sacrifice for our sins. These are a precious few moments in which we can reflect upon and ponder what he accomplished on our behalf.

All Christians, no matter how they celebrate the expiation of Christ, recognize the instigation of that ordinance by the Savior during the Passover (Pesach) in Jerusalem just prior to his crucifixion.

And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body.
And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it;
For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. (Matthew 26:26-28.)

If they pay attention in classes, Latter-day Saints will have learned about the historical roots of Passover in the events of the Israelites’ Exodus from Egypt, which included a hastily consumed meal that came to be known in Jewish tradition as Seder.

Since Seder includes the ritual consumption of certain foods, it seems appropriate that Christ would choose that occasion to instigate another eating ritual to encourage his followers to recall his primary mission to Earth: the resurrection of all and salvation for those who seek it.

Looking deeper into the past

Christians believe that the Sacrament originated with Christ. Hence, no investigation of the ordinance goes beyond that point.

What most Christians and Latter-day Saints do not know is that the origins of the Sacrament, like most Christian conventions, are to be found much further back in time, in ancient custom and tradition. In fact, there is credible evidence that its roots go much deeper into ancient tradition than most consider. This evidence points to the source of such rituals in the heaven-spanning specters that once dominated Earth’s skies.

As it turns out, the scriptures tell us of a ritual meal consumed by idolatrous Israelites that is clearly a prototype of the Sacrament, leading to the surprising conclusion that the Savior borrowed a custom or tradition that was already ancient in his day, and then adopted and adapted it to use as an ordinance.

To understand the ancient origins of the Sacrament, we must go back in time to the reign of judges in Israel after the conquest of Canaan and the Philistines by Joshua’s armies.

Shortly after Joshua’s death, the Israelites began worshipping the gods of their neighbors. In Judges we read:

And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and served Baalim:

And they forsook the LORD God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them, and provoked the LORD to anger.

And they forsook the LORD, and served Baal and Ashtaroth. (Judges 2:11, 12, 13.)

And the children of Israel did evil again in the sight of the LORD, and served Baalim, and Ashtaroth, and the gods of Syria, and the gods of Zidon, and the gods of Moab, and the gods of the children of Ammon, and the gods of the Philistines, and forsook the LORD, and served not him. (Judges 10:6.)

Here we have an unequivocal statement that the Israelites adopted the idolatrous worship of neighboring cultures. Indeed, one might argue that they never actually abandoned the beliefs and practices that they learned while in bondage in Egypt.

Even though the generation that followed Moses out of Egypt had long passed away by the era covered in Judges, the text clearly indicates that they passed on to their children a tendency to accept idolatrous beliefs and practices, suggesting that vestiges of idolatry bridged the gap from one generation to another, down through the ages.

On the earth, as in heaven

Of course, we’ve learned elsewhere that those idolatrous traditions were based entirely in ancient astral events. They were symbolic of things that were once seen to happen in Earth’s tumultuous skies.

More specifically, we know that Baal (Apollo) was Mars and Ashtaroth (Ishtar, Aphrodite) was Venus, the two primary actors in the Polar Configuration.

These idolatrous practices flourished over time to become an integral part of Israelite culture. Indeed, they endured on into the epoch of the Israelite monarchy where Yahweh was no longer revered as the only god. In fact, he was worshipped as one of many gods.

For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians, and after Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites.

And Solomon did evil in the sight of the LORD, and went not fully after the LORD, as did David his father.

Then did Solomon build an high place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, in the hill that is before Jerusalem, and for Molech, the abomination of the children of Ammon.

And likewise did he for all his strange wives, which burnt incense and sacrificed unto their gods. (1 Kings 11:5-8.)

And the high places that were before Jerusalem, which were on the right hand of the mount of corruption, which Solomon the king of Israel had builded for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Zidonians, and for Chemosh the abomination of the Moabites, and for Milcom the abomination of the children of Ammon, did the king defile. (2 Kings 23:13.)

Thus we see that the customs, rituals and practices attendant to the worship of those idols was fully integrated into Israelite culture for many generations, insomuch that they became an indistinguishable part of the religion Moses had originally given them.

We see the pervasiveness of such practices many generations later in events recorded by the prophet Jeremiah.

Therefore pray not thou for this people, neither lift up cry nor prayer for them, neither make intercession to me: for I will not hear thee.
Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods, that they may provoke me to anger. (Jeremiah 7:16-18.)

The Lord condemned Israel through Jeremiah for their perfidy. In addition to practicing the abominable ritual of child sacrifice to the heathen god Moloch, Jeremiah’s account explains that they worshipped “the queen of heaven,” making “cakes” and “drink offerings.”

The queen was a star and a planet

This Queen of Heaven that Jeremiah despised was none other than Ashtoreth, mentioned in the quotes from 1st and 2nd Kings. She was the great star goddess (Venus) of antiquity, the mother of the son (Mars) of god (Saturn).

As an aside, it is worthy of note that the Roman Catholics adopted the imagery of the Queen of Heaven for their worship of the Virgin Mary, the mother of Christ. In that role, she is an ideal fit for all the imagery and veneration of her prototype in nearly every ancient culture since they all had an equivalent goddess they worshipped as the Queen of Heaven and the mother of god, whether she was called Ashtoreth, Ishtar, Isis, or some other title. Thus, when Christianity was taken to other “gentile” cultures, they readily accepted the Virgin Mary imagery. This was even true for Mesoamerican peoples such as the Inca, Maya and Aztecs.

A ritual meal

Of particular interest in our quest to understand the origins of the Sacrament is the practice of making cakes and drink offerings mentioned in the preceding verses.

In the following verses we learn that in spite of Jeremiah’s pleas to abandon such rituals, the people vowed to continue them because they were traditional.

Then all the men which knew that their wives had burned incense unto other gods, and all the women that stood by, a great multitude, even all the people that dwelt in the land of Egypt, in Pathros, answered Jeremiah, saying,

As for the word that thou hast spoken unto us in the name of the LORD, we will not hearken unto thee.

But we will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth forth out of our own mouth, to burn incense unto the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto her, as we have done, we, and our fathers, our kings, and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem: for then had we plenty of victuals, and were well, and saw no evil.

But since we left off to burn incense to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto her, we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine.

And when we burned incense to the queen of heaven, and poured out drink offerings unto her, did we make her cakes to worship her, and pour out drink offerings unto her, without our men? (Jeremiah 44:15-19, italics added.)

These cakes and drinks they made were not simply used as an offering placed upon some alter or set aside in a shrine. They were ultimately consumed ritually, just as were all the animal sacrifices of the Israelites.

As is the case for all such rituals or rites, they were done to recall some aspect of the ancient configuration that once stood above the Earth.

Hot cross buns and the Queen of Heaven

Another curious connection to these rites is found in European pre-history. When the northern tribes of Israel ultimately migrated into Europe, they took these traditions with them. So it should not surprise us to learn that the traditions of many European cultures preserve vestiges of these practices.

Our holiday now connected with the Savior’s resurrection, Easter, is just such a tradition. It began as a celebration, a holiday (holy day) consecrated to the Queen of Heaven: Aster, Astarte, Ishtar or Ashtoreth. One custom connected with that holiday is the making of hot cross buns. In effect, buns were made that bore the image of the goddess, which was a cross.

The cross placed on the hot cross buns is the same image that history tells us was placed on the cakes made by the women of Jerusalem in the Jeremiah text. Not only that, the European tradition indicates that those cakes were made to be eaten, just as are their equivalents today. The cross was the explicit ancient symbol of the star goddess since she ultimately assumed the form of the cross in heaven. The “cakes” or buns were made in the image of the goddess.


Here we see a discharging Venus forming four arms or streams, setting behind the darker orb Mars and in front of the larger face of Saturn. This is the archetypal image replicated in the hot cross buns of Easter.

Learning the lessons of history

So, we learn yet another connection of the idolatrous practices of the ancients to our modern cultural traditions which serves to demonstrate how pervasive and enduring are these traditional practices. Just as with the Christmas traditions — in fact, the traditions of all holidays (holy days), which all harken back to celestial events — they endure in one form or another in contemporary culture, even after memory of the origins are long lost and forgotten in hoary antiquity.

And so it was with the worship of the Queen of Heaven, the great star goddess of antiquity. When the ancient Israelites ate the cakes and drank the drink offering, they made a covenant to remember her, to recall how she brought the heavens to life and lit the Earth with her glory, as well as nurturing the child (Mars) she bore. Cakes and beer or wine were chosen because those were ultimately the edible fruits of the Earth over which Venus ruled. Hence, she was the prototype of Mother Nature as well.

She was called the Queen of Heaven for good reason. Sumerian texts tell of her “terrifying glory,” invoking Inanna (Venus) as the goddess of “the Light of the World”, “the Amazement of the Lands”, “the Radiant Star” and “Great Light.” They depict the goddess “clothed in radiance,” saying that the world stood in “fear and trembling at [her] tempestuous radiance.”

So, when the Savior wished to initiate an ordinance that would remind his followers of his role as Redeemer and “light of the world,” the thought of adopting this ritual to the light goddess naturally came to him. Not only was the ritual customary in his culture, making it an easy transition for his followers, he must have known that similar customs in other cultures would pave the way for adopting the ritual among converts to the ‘new’ religion, Christianity.

Supportive of this thesis is the fact that the cross once seen in heaven emanating from the sky goddess became the principle symbol of Christ in the emerging Catholic and Eastern Orthodox religions. Clearly, converts from paganism to Christianity had no problem with applying both the cross symbol of their sky goddess and the ritual meal commemorating her to the worship of the real Son of God, the Savior in their new religion.

When we take the Sacrament, we covenant to remember the Savior and the role he plays in creation and more particularly in our redemption. He chose to have the bread represent his body and the water to represent his blood, a logical and natural adaptation of the original offering to the meaning of the Christian Sacrament.

Thus we see that the archetypal ordinance, the predecessor of the Sacrament, served the same function in the religions of all ancient cultures as it does in Christianity.

Learning new lessons from the past

Such knowledge teaches us many things. We learn that our practices and beliefs are not that much different from those of cultures we have heretofore seen as strange and esoteric, completely unrelated to the gospel. We see that the gospel can easily be adapted to the traditions of almost any culture because its rituals arise from common roots in ancient celestial events and conditions. Indeed, one may say that all gospel ordinances came into being in a similar manner and for similar reasons.

We learn that Christian ordinances serve to connect us to our ancestors in a very intimate way, even though they may have been somewhat altered and misapplied by less enlightened cultures. We learn that the Savior found nothing improper in borrowing those traditions and adapting them to correct religious practice in order to make it easier for the wayward human race to embrace his gospel and its ordinances.

Thus, the hue and cry among Christians and some Mormons that holidays like Christmas and Easter — even Halloween — are pagan rites, and thus beneath our dignity as followers of Christ and worthy only of our contempt, is flawed. These are valid traditional celebrations that have been adapted as Christian holidays.

Borrowing: a time honored tradition

Moreover — and perhaps the most important lesson we should learn from all this — when Joseph Smith borrowed the vestiges of ancient temple rites and ritual from Masonry, the only institution on the American frontier in the early 1800s that retained some semblance of those rites and ordinances and adapted them for use in LDS temples, he was merely following the Savior’s pattern in such things.

This also partially explains the presence of idolatrous icons all over modern LDS temples, including the statue of the Greek Aphrodite that stands watch over the veil in the Celestial Room of the Salt Lake Temple.

Such issues are only a problem for those who do not understand the origin and purpose of such practices or icons and the methodology that allows their adoption and adaptation as necessary or useful. When seen in the revelatory light of a proper view of history, there is no need for concern or anxiety at these measures.

Now we can see them in their true role as cultural traditions meant to remind us of things our culture has forgotten, vestiges of a past that entirely elud us today. Their whole purpose is to help us recall our past, one most Saints seem intent on ignoring even though their founding prophet did all he could to resurrect that knowledge.

Modern ignorance

The ancients would surely be appalled at our ignorance and disregard for the messages they labored to communicate to us down through the ages by means of the symbolism in their texts and the iconography of their sacred temples, tombs and monuments. Given that the true gospel was restored via revelation to Latter-day Saints in this dispensation, our present level of ignorance places added condemnation upon us.

If we forget their origins and true meaning, which most of us have, then these ordinances are only harmless, if somewhat meaningful, rituals. But when we study our past and learn its lessons, these practices serve to immeasurably enrich our lives and further our commitment to our religion and our Savior while connecting us to the beliefs and traditions our ancestors embraced.

This is the primary benefit of learning truth, the correct version of the present, the past and the future—as the Lord put it to Joseph Smith, “things as they are, as they were and as they are to come.”

© Anthony E. Larson, 2005